Travel

by Hannah Lemmon
Photos of Sikkim by Nabila Sajjad, Gr.9 AIS,D

A Kingdom in the Clouds – trekking in Sikkim

 Having rendezvoused with three friends from London at the Sonar Bangla Hotel in Kolkata, we bid fond farewells to the lap of luxury and embarked upon our trekking adventure. We began our odessey of discomfort by squeezing four overgrown men, five overstuffed rucksacks and one small but well-proportioned woman into the back of an ambassador taxi as far as the domestic terminal of Kolkata airport. One very thorough customs exam later (understandable considering our ‘eclectic’ traveling attire) and we were bound for Bagdogra.

 We were met by a smiling, wordless young man who relieved us of passports, luggage tickets and flight coupons and promptly disappeared into the bowels of the airport. Just as we were beginning to panic about how to explain to the nice men at immigration how we managed to lose any documentation to confirm our identities or eligibility to be in their fine country, the young man reappeared smiling cheerfully with our bags, our immigration stamps and a trolley.
After a refreshing draught of the local brew, aptly named Hit, we embarked on a jaw-clenching 6-hour drive along winding roads suspended perilously over sheer drops into cavernous ravines. Coming from the hot, flat plains of Dhaka, the sudden climb into cool, mountainous forests was exhilarating.

We picked up our land pass permits for Sikkim at Rangpo with minimum fuss (meaning that the gentlemen of our party engaged in a game of volleyball with the local barflies while I was left to nod and smile encouragingly at the border guard who was eyeing my passport photo with curiosity). You can also get the permits at Darjeeling and Siliguri; they cost around $40 and require two passport photos.

We arrived in Gangtok at about 7pm and went directly to the Hotel Flaura Fauna. ‘Flora’ and ‘Fauna’ would not have been the first words that popped into my head to describe our hotel. The service was unfathomably slow. Still, at 600 rupees a night for a double/twin room and with hot water and comfy beds, it was a start.

Due to the alarming inability of BA to reunite one of our trekking party with his lost luggage, we busied ourselves by visiting local beauty spots, enjoying the midday sunshine on assorted balconies (traveler chic and good lattes at the Jazz Café and more sophisticated luncheon fare and cold Hit at the upmarket Hotel Tibet) and riding yaks to the Chinese border, which was great fun and at Rs.200 a go, but the unpredictability of the yaks did make for some tense moments.

In the evenings we frequented the government-owned Blue Sheep restaurant on the main market, where we had tasty Murgh Malai and Dal bukhara. We also enjoyed the hospitality of our trek organizer Tashila (of Tashila Tours, www.tashila.com, with whom we would most certainly travel again and would definitely recommend to anyone thinking of visiting the region) and his wife Ladip, who plied us with cold drinks and hot momos and generally made us feel very welcome in Sikkim.

Following the reunion of bag and owner, we drove six hours to Yuksom, where three venerable lamas (three wise men) are said to have entered Sikkim from three different directions at the same time to choose a temporal and religious head to rule over the mountainous region. It is a peaceful, friendly place with plenty of small family-run chalets and a couple of more up-market guesthouses. The main street has a few very relaxed outdoor cafes serving great noodle soup and soft drinks.

On a clear morning we strapped on our boots and began our trek from Yoksam (1900m) to Tsoka (3000). The trail climbed up the side of the valley, crossing the river several times and ending with a steep one-and-a-half-hour slog up to our campsite. Jostling for space with the yaks, we scrambled up the last few hundred metres to examine our mountain view and saw.....nothing, as the mist had come in. We spent the rest of the evening drinking tea, playing card games with unprintable names and generally congratulating ourselves on having survived the first day.

In the morning, after a cursory dabble in a bowl of lukewarm water, we had our first views back down the valley and on to Kachenjonga. They were so good that we devoured our porridge and eggs and set off up the hill like the mountain gazelles we saw ourselves as. Unfortunately, this was the steepest climb we had to do, and the weather was not obliging. Five hours of hail and sleet later we arrived at Dzongri (4000m) in thick mist. Not even the excellent meal the guides had miraculously prepared on two paraffin stoves could cheer us. We headed to our tents cold and wet, feeling sorry for ourselves.

We woke at 5am to a crystal clear day. The sun was breaking over the mountains, with white frost sparkling on the surrounding hills. We climbed up to a little Buddhist monument and took photos of the mountains, splendid in the sunlight. The rest of the day was spent acclimatizing, listening to music on the iPod (THE trekking accessory), and generally feeling sheepish for having been so despondent the day before.

The next day we walked on to Semiti Lake (4300m), our last camp before the climb to the Goche-la Pass (5000m) where we would have our big views of the Kachenjonga peak, the third largest mountain in the world. Suffering from the effects of high altitude, we repaired to our tents in quiet anticipation of the next day’s climb.

At 3am the porters woke us with hot, black Sherpa tea. We struggled into our warmest clothes (the outside temperature was -50C), put on our head torches and set off cautiously up the scree-covered path to the valley above. As we climbed, the sun began to touch the tops of the peak.

Trekking through a dried-out river-bed of grey-white sand, we could see huge, white peaks appearing out of the gloom all around us. We made the summit after 3 hours of walking, our speed slowed dramatically by the altitude (WomUN may be pleased to note that, in keeping with the natural order of things, the lady made it to the top first!)

Standing in the little crux between Pandem, Kachenjonga and the ridge that forms the Nepal border, we took pictures and spent time just contemplating our surroundings, before retreating from the cold. Buoyed by our achievement, the mood on the down-climb was exhuberant. 200 metres above the camp our guide Kajon and some of the porters who had brought a radio and some hot lemon juice greeted us. We sat in the sun, listening to Nepali beats and feeling very pleased with ourselves.

That night we climbed back down to the river valley and passed a noisy night playing cards and drinking local Shangri-la whiskey with our team, without whom we’d never have got anywhere near the pass. The climb down was in warm sunshine and as we passed trekkers on the way up, it was very difficult to keep the benevolent, smug smiles off our faces as we assured them that it wasn’t ‘too far now’.

Back at our camp at Tsoka, we met up with other groups and a mass sing-along broke out, a guitar appeared and we celebrated well into the night. After a night in Yuksom where we bid fond farewells to the fine men (and yaks) who’d carried our camp to 4000m and back, we drove out of Sikkim to Darjeeling. Even our most die-hard budget travelers agreed that we had earned a night of relative comfort after a week of bucket showers, dug-out toilets and camping mats. So we stayed at the Dekeling Resort, an old Colonial house with rooms with fireplaces (fires are laid every day), en-suite sitting rooms and bathroms and a wood-pannelled reading room with 270 degree views of the Darjeeling valley for Rs.2200 per room per night. Not wishing to completely miss out on the Colonial experience, we headed to one of the posh hotels, The Elgin and enjoyed G&T’s in our last set of clean clothes.

It was a real wrench to leave Darjeeling and the mountain villages behind. Everywhere we went, we bumped into fellow trekkers and shared grins of camaraderie; we’d been there, seen that, and made it back in time for tea!
 

~Our trek with Tashila Tours cost $35/person/day incl. permits, transport, two nights hotel accommodation in Yuksom, guides, porters, yaks and all meals. It was worth every cent.